Koetsu Rosewood Sig or other Koetsu on medium mass arms

@fjn04 

I've set up a truckload of Koetsu's across the board from Blacks, Reds,  to the stone bodied on a range of arms. One point I would suggest you have a think about is where are you going with your front end.

There is a valid argument from my own experience that you would probably get a better outcome if you upgraded from the Reference 313 to the 4Point11 first if you can. This will give you a sustantially better outcome when you do buy a Koetsu - one that will last you for years.

Franc said via email... his arms are designed to work with the best low compliance cartridges. He certainly went further with a more technical explanation, but I didn't want to quote him word for word. He also brought my attention to a recent Dick Olsher review in TAS, which I had already read. Dick had the Rose Sig on my exact table and arm. The review wasn’t the best written, but he certainly liked the Rose Sig.

According to posts on this site Mark Baker offers some of the worst customer service of any equipment manufacturer which is sad because his arms are not bad.

Frank Kuzma is a very interesting guy. Here is an interview. It transfers to English during the interview.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UWvXgfjEPoA
He will do and try just about anything, any type of tonearm, any type of turntable. The only thing I can think of that he does not do are MM cartridges. Like Frank Schroder some of his designs go a step further into the brilliant category like the 4 Point arms. He now makes a full air bearing turntable. Some of his designs violate his own principles, I guess out of his desire to meet market demands or keep the price down. The Stabi M is a fantastic turntable.

@fjn04 

Send Franc Kuzma an email and ask for his opinion/experience.  

Hey Einstein, it sure ain’t rocket science!
https://www.gcaudio.com/tips-tricks/tonearm-cartridge-compatability/

I'm sorry, oh great one, but I still don't know who Mark Baker is, in the sense that I should need to care about his opinion.  Much of what you say he says is much like what I wrote about the uncertainties of the calculation for any private end user, which make the resulting calculated resonant frequency something you should take with a grain of salt, although I suppose he took several paragraphs to say it in more detail. I won't respond to the ad hominems.  Have you figured out the root cause of the skating force yet?

Millercarbon-

Another thing I know for sure, this business of compliance and mass is pure theory. On that score I am in perfect agreement with Origin Live founder Mark Baker: "theory bears little or no relation to reality."   

lewm-

I have no idea who Mark Baker is

fjn04,
This exchange and the other comments above should be enough to tell you all you need to know about this site. There's guys here who truly cannot comprehend even the clearest most concise and simple sentence. I clearly stated "Origin Live founder Mark Baker" and yet lewm has no idea who he is. Because lewm has no idea at all of anything he reads - or writes, for that matter. 

Then you have two other guys all beating the same drum, all patting each other on the back. All ignoring the facts. 

If you read the Mark Baker article I linked to it will be clear why this theory everyone is so in love with is so irrelevant. For one thing because as he mentions there is more than one cartridge compliance. Compliance in one direction like left to right is often times different than compliance up and down. On stereo recordings in case you don't know the groove wall modulation is both L/R as well as up/down. 

Will the Koetsu work well on your arm? If it is a well-designed arm then yes, it will. Unfortunately we have a situation where all the same guys who can't understand why compliance doesn't matter are in love with the idea all arms are great. Instead of facing facts and accepting that the arm that is bad with one cartridge is simply due to the fact it is a bad arm they insist the arm must be good and use this irrelevant theory in support of their obviously false claim.

In other words, if the Koetsu sings on your arm then yes (probably) it is a good arm. If it flounders, well we know Koetsu makes a fine cartridge so that can't be it and so in that case sorry, must be the arm. 

These guys hate that answer because look, they all bought arms that had these problems. Otherwise, if they bought arms like me they wouldn't care, just like I don't care. I don't waste one minute looking at this stuff. Only when somebody wants help, then I suit up and take the shots so at least you have a chance.  

Said it before, say it again: this stuff just isn't that hard, except for all the people making it hard! 

I highly recommend you click the hell off this site and spend some time on Origin Live (where they know arms because they make them) or Soundsmith (where they know cartridges because they make them) or anywhere other than here, where more often than not it is all make believe.

Appreciate this so far...It sounds like we should pay attention to specs/matching, yet it’s likely not bible. I’ve enjoyed Koetsu’s (Rosewood standard and Rosewood Sig) on a Graham 2.2. This is going back too far to help myself here, but I believe others have had success using medium mass (<25 Gram) arms. However, I’m sure choosing a lighter arm increases the chance of running in to a mismatch. Perhaps there are still a number of good med mass choices, such as a well made gimbal arm. I’m going by what I’ve heard in my last sentence, but sometimes we have to operate without an abundance of info. Let’s face it, interest isn’t at an all time high in this hobby.

Here ya go!
The effective mass is the mass of the tonearm, including the headshell, seen by the stylus. A mass of 10 grams or lower is considered a low mass arm. A mass of 11-25 grams is considered moderate mass, and an arm rated at above 25 grams is considered high mass.

The only thing I can add to Lewm's excellent post is that you always use a disc with horizontal and vertical resonance tracks and test it yourself. Starting out with a lighter arm is safe. You can always add mass but it can be very tough to remove it. My guess is that you will have to add some. Soundsmith sells and excellent set of graded cartridge mounting knurled screws. https://sound-smith.com/accessories/ez-mount-cartridge-screws
I like to get it as low as possible about 8 Hz. My experience with subwoofers is that this improves the bass. Not what you hear but what you feel.

In fact, according to the internet, your tonearm (Origin Live Conqueror) has an effective mass of 19g, so it is on the upper edge of the category of "medium mass", whatever that is.  In fact, can someone define "medium effective mass", for a tonearm?  In my mind, it's from about 10-11g to about 15-18g, but I have no idea what other people are thinking when they quote the term "medium mass".  Regardless of the jargon, the resonant frequency of your OLC plus Koetsu should be well within the recommended range of 8 to 12Hz, so your combo sheds no light on your claim that the relationship is unimportant.  Maybe it is; maybe it isn't.  I don't assign too much importance to it either. 


I have no idea who Mark Baker is, but the calculation is theoretical, because in fact we usually don't really know with any degree of accuracy what actually is the effective mass of our tonearm/cartridge/headshell hardware or the compliance of our particular cartridge sample.  (Compliance may change due to age and use of any cartridge and due to sample to sample variability.)  In that sense, the result of the equation is theoretical.  But the equation itself is solid physics.

You will find plenty of guys here eager to tell you all about the importance of mass and compliaal\[fisa[d iu ]asu fklfgn;alfhg; sorry, this subject is so exciting I dozed off. My Koetsu Black Goldline is used on a 13 year old Origin Live Conqueror arm. Pretty sure both the arm and the cartridge have mass. Whether that mass is "medium" (whatever the hell that means) I haven't the foggiest.  

One thing I know from actual experience, this Koetsu on this arm sounds freaking fantastic! This triggers folks but I don't know why. Not like it's any big secret. Not like they aren't all invited to come and hear for themselves. So I guess if you can figure out to what degree (if any) my arm is "medium mass" then you will have your "medium mass" answer.

Another thing I know for sure, this business of compliance and mass is pure theory. On that score I am in perfect agreement with Origin Live founder Mark Baker: "theory bears little or no relation to reality."  

https://www.originlive.com/faq-items/cartridges-work-well-origin-live-arm/
I am on the same page as Mark Baker. A very good place to be.

I don't know that it has strictly to do with the formula for resonant frequency, but my Koetsu Urushi did not come into its own until I mounted it in a headshell/tonearm with much higher effective mass (Ortofon LH9000 that weighs 18g by itself, on a FR64S tonearm).  Prior to that it sounded good but not transcendent on my Triplanar.

You can do the math!
http://www.mh-audio.nl/Calculators/RF.html